Audit To Begin On Keenan House Records

March 20, 1985|The Morning Call

An audit of Keenan House by the Lehigh County controller's office has still not begun despite the fact that the residential drug treatment agency's books and records were found to be in "poor condition" within the past year.

But Thomas Shedlock, audit supervisor in the county controller's office, said the county plans to begin its audit tomorrow morning. He said there has been several weeks of correspondence between Keenan House officials and the controller's office.

Dorothy Lopinto, fiscal manager for Keenan House, confirmed on Jan. 28 that County Controller Frank Concannon and his staff were planning an audit because of the agency's inadequate maintenance of financial records.

In January, Concannon said his staff was planning to audit the agency and the examination of the fiscal records would take five or six weeks. A report would be issued since Keenan House receives county funding.

Lopinto said at that time, the agency's fiscal records were "in poor condition" last summer but she and Concannon stressed there was no evidence of missing funds.

She said she was hired in August and has 24 years of fiscal management experience working for social agencies.

Concannon disclosed then he was asked by Rob Fulton, county director of planning and development, what to do about a report on Keenan House from the private auditing firm of Campbell, Rappold & Yurasits of Allentown.

That company audited Keenan House records for United Way, according to Lopinto and Concannon, and the auditing firm was unable to issue a professional opinion as to the agency's financial status because of the poor records keeping.

The audit covered the fiscal year ended last June 30.

Prior to that time, the annual audit of the agency's records was done by the county controller but the examination for the fiscal year 1983-84 was done by a private auditing firm because Keenan House became a United Way agency during that period.

Concannon said Keenan House received only $3,000 from United Way for 1983-84 but that 60 percent of the agency's annual receipts of more than $500,000 came from Lehigh County sources. The controller said the agency operates by charging fees for its services and receives funds from a number of county government or county court sources.